Extras! 04 July 2014

Welcome to The Extras! A daily dose of all the smaller movie related news, clips and just plain cool stuff that you might have missed!

Happy Independence Day to all our friends over in Obamaland! Hope you get to punch lots of aliens today! And to celebrate the Fourth of Juy, here’s a new theme song for Captain America that more accurately reflects the current statistics of the country.

Looks like Ken Jeong has finally gotten over his bad babbalas (I’m still feeling the after-effects though) and has decided to go for a drive with some funny black guys. The Hangover Trilogy star has joined Kevin Hart and Ice Cube in Ride Along 2, the sequel to the hit comedy (it made $153 million off a $25 million budget) released earlier this year. Jeong’s role – which is being compared to the third wheel turn that Joe Pesci performed in Lethal Weapon 2 – is that of “a cocky computer hacker who fancies himself a ladies man but who also is key in solving the case that Cube and Hart are working on.”

As director Guillermo Del Toro revealed earlier, Pacific Rim 2 will be trying to tackle some new things so that it can stand on its own as a movie. That’s a very good thing to hear, especially in light of this article from THR who have one big problem with the planned sequel: All the story was already told in Pacific Rim 1.

Looks like Guardians of the Galaxy has now also got into the whole viral marketing thing, as it has launched Galaxy Getaways, a website offering trips and tours all over the galaxy, including some of the places seen in the movie.

We’re sure that Andy Serkis is a very nice bloke when he’s not running around pretending to be an emaciated Hobbit with deep psychological issues or a genetically modified ape named after a Roman emperor, but apparently it may not be his winning personality that landed him his role in JJ Abrams’ upcoming Star Wars: Episode VII. In fact it wasn’t even him running around pretending to be a Hobbit or ape, at least not the characters we saw on screen. According to Dawn of the Planet of the Apes director Matt Reeves, Serkis’ gig may have had a little something with him showing Abrams an unfinished cut of his movie,during which Abrams actually saw just what a great actor Serkis is when he doesn’t have a creature digitally painted over him.

“I showed him a bit of the movie. I wanted to get some feedback. And I know that he had known and really loved Andy Serkis. But it’s the same experience I had coming in and asking to see all the footage of Andy from Rise with him in his helmet cam, so that I could understand exactly what the process was. And the thing that struck me, and actually got me so excited, was the mystery behind how great he is, is that he’s great. That he’s an amazing actor. And the scenes that I showed him were of Andy just in mo-cap. And he was like “oh my God, he’s an incredible actor.” He was so blown away.

And now he’s in Star Wars. I don’t know if that had a direct… I mean, it could, [and] I think he’d always loved Andy. And they had known each other a bit before, anyway. But I think when he saw it, it was like a real revelation. He said to me, “that looks — I’m not kidding when I tell you I think that’s one of the best performances I’ve ever seen.” I said “I know, isn’t he amazing?” He’s so good.”

Marvel Comics pioneer and comic book legend Stan Lee has a bone to pick with modern movies: Why are their credits to darn long?

If you’ve been in a romantic relationship for any extended period of time, there’s a good chance you’ve either watched, been forced to watch or been compared to The Notebook. The romantic drama – according to its fan; I would call it typical Nicholas Sparks saccharine rubbish, but that’s me – is one of most beautiful love stories ever told. But that’s apparently the exact opposite of what it was actually like on the movie’s set. While they may have played the dream couple on screen, Ryan Gosling and Rachel McAdam reportedly detested one another, to the point that Gosling tried to get her fired from the film. Director Nick Cassavettes revealed this fact recently, adding that tension only started to subside when he and the crew forced the two into a trailer together where they then engaged in an epic shouting match to air all their grievances.

The Great Geek War of Star Wars vs Star Trek has been raging for decades. And here is the latest battle… set to music.

If you have anything you would like to contribute to Extras, whether it be interesting stories, funny videos, or artistic photos of yourself in morally questionable poses, feel free to drop a mail to [email protected]

A man of many passions - but very little sleep - I've been geeking out over movies, video games, comics, books, anime, TV series and lemon meringues as far back as I can remember. So show up for the geeky insight, stay for the delicious pastries.

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